Ruins (Pathfinder 2)

They only had the Odinfolders’ word for it that any person that developed serious weapons would be killed, that they had broken into the programs that controlled the Wall but for some reason couldn’t break into the programs controlling the orbiters. It also seemed unbelievable to Umbo that the Odinfolders were really going to leave all the decisions up to the Ramfolders. That had to be illusory. They would think they were making the decisions, but in fact they were being shaped, forced into a certain path by the information the Odinfolders gave them, and the information they withheld.

Yet how could he discuss his doubts with any of his party? Down i

n the library, surrounded by mice that seemed to understand human speech, it seemed likely that everything they said was recorded for later study by the Odinfolders. And the mice were outdoors, too. A spy network covering the entire wallfold.

One question that bothered Umbo was the way the villages of the ten thousand remaining Odinfolders were all clustered near the Wall, according to their own maps, leaving the vast center of their country for the animals, which were reputedly wild but were quite possibly as domesticated as the mice.

Another question was why all the wallfolds were named for the colonist who played the dominant role in their earliest years. And yet this wallfold and Umbo’s home wallfold were both named for the same man, Ram Odin, the captain of the starship. Supposedly Ram Odin had only come to the surface of Garden in the one fold, Ramfold; why, then, was Odinfold also named for him? And if the story was wrong, and there was a copy of Ram Odin in every wallfold, just as there was a copy of everyone else, why did he dominate in only two of the colonies? Why not all of them?

Yet these matters were not discussed in any of the books Umbo found. He deliberately asked for books that dealt with the earliest history of all the wallfolds, supposedly looking for references to the starships buried in each wallfold, but what he searched for was any reference to Ram Odin. Yet even in Ramfold and Odinfold, it was as if the man were legendary from the start, never actually living among the people.

How could he not live among them? He had descendants—the time-shifters of Ramfold were supposedly all descended from him. Were the time-shifting machines of the Odinfolders also using some ability that came from Ram Odin? Had he fathered children in both wallfolds? If so, then why not others?

Mouse-Breeder and Swims-in-the-Air were so nice, so patient, so wise—but Umbo wondered how nice they’d be if he started asking these questions openly. They were such obvious matters that Umbo couldn’t believe he was the only one who thought of them—yet no one said anything or asked anything. It was as if they all knew that these subjects were forbidden even to think about.

But Umbo thought about them. Thought and studied and tried to get around the lack of information, but what the Odinfolders didn’t want him to find, he did not find.

After the meeting where they had decided to do nothing and merely observe the Visitors this time around, Umbo went back to his lonely studies, just as the others did. Oh, they were sociable enough at mealtimes, sharing interesting tidbits from their research, joking with each other, offering theories about the people of Earth. But they never said anything personal or important, at least not in front of Umbo.

Is everyone silent with everyone else? Umbo wondered. Or is it just around me that they say nothing significant? Am I being frozen out, or are we all living in private worlds?

Human beings were not meant to lead such solitary lives.

And then one day it dawned on him that he might have a tool that would let him get answers in spite of the Odinfolders’ evasions, deceptions, and concealments. He had the knife.

The knife that the Odinfolders admitted to having made and then planted on the person Rigg stole it from, the first time they deliberately combined their talents in order to travel into the past. The knife that had replicas of the nineteen jewels embedded in the hilt.

How faithfully had the stones been replicated? Could they also control the ships? Control the Wall? Could the knife be used to communicate with the orbiters?

What had the Odinfolders made it for? Why had they given it to them? What did they make of the fact that it was Umbo who had been in control of it since Rigg was arrested in O, and even after his escape, when he could have taken it back?

Yet how could Umbo test the knife? What could he possibly do without being reported on to the Odinfolders?

And then it dawned on him: Why conceal it? Why not simply ask to go to the ship that was buried somewhere in the heart of Odinfold? It was a natural culmination of his study of the starships.

“I need to go to the starship,” Umbo announced at dinner.

“Want company?” asked Rigg. “Or is this a solitary adventure?”

If Rigg went along, then it would be Rigg’s expedition, and if any good came from it, it would be Rigg’s achievement. Not because Rigg took credit. If anything, Rigg shunted praise away from himself. But that very fact would make it all the more likely that people would give him credit for anything Umbo found in the starship.

What Umbo wanted was for Param to go with him. He wanted Param to invite herself, to choose to be with him.

But she was so lost in her own thoughts that Umbo wondered how she managed to get the food into her mouth instead of smearing it all over her face.

She had no use for him, that was plain. But Umbo’s consolation was that she showed no special favor toward Olivenko, either. She wasn’t closing herself off by disappearing constantly, as she had done in Flacommo’s house. So it wasn’t that she objected to their company or fled it; she simply didn’t have the same need to connect with other people that Umbo had.

Nonsense. Human beings had the need to be part of a community, even if they were introverted or shy or suspicious of others, even if they weren’t joiners. So how was Param meeting that need? What was she part of? If it was this group, Umbo saw no sign of it. She treated them as distantly as she did the Odinfolders.

Or maybe she behaved completely differently when Umbo wasn’t around. Maybe the others all regarded Umbo as the weak one, the untrustworthy one. The one who had cried when he found out he wasn’t his father’s son. The one who had been sniping at Rigg in obvious, childish resentment. Umbo wasn’t ashamed of having felt as he did—Rigg really did assume command at times when he didn’t know any more than any of the others. But Umbo wished he had borne it in patience, never letting his resentment show. Because he suspected that now the others all regarded him as the one who couldn’t be told things, or he’d make a scene, cause a problem.

Sometimes it’s better to face a small problem now than a huge one later, that’s how he wanted to answer them.

But since he didn’t absolutely know that they were all freezing him out in order not to rile him, he couldn’t confront anybody about it without seeming paranoid.

Umbo wasn’t a loner. He liked being part of a community. He liked having close friends. He liked feeling accepted and trusted. And when he felt that he wasn’t accepted, wasn’t trusted, it made him feel lonely and angry and hurt and resentful. Precisely the feelings that had probably cost him the others’ trust in the first place.

Yet he couldn’t bring himself to try to make things right with Rigg. Let him apologize! He was the one who had created a rift between them, with his officious attitude, the way he and everybody else treated Umbo as if he were unworthy of being consulted.